Glass Message Board
Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass => Topic started by: Littleblackhen on October 11, 2008, 10:42:59 AM
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I bought this lovely cameo vase off ebay, unfortunately it has arrived in two pieces :(
Several questions - does anyone know how I claim compensation, it was sent royal mail first class signed for delivery?
Second, what exactly is it I have lost? The opalescent glass glows under UV and is quite nice quality.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140269409464&_trksid=p2761.l1259
I will post more photos later for identification, of the broken pieces :(
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1st class signed-for doesn't cover breakage to glass as a rule, but since it's a low amount it's not unknown for them to pay up anyway. Keep all packaging, if it wasn't very securely packed then don't bother with the RM just put some gentle polite pressure on the seller, it's not really enough money for the seller to risk a negative. If you paid via paypal you could escalate this to a dispute. Otherwise get a claims form from the Post Office and copy of the proof of posting from the seller, cross your fingers and prepare for a long and potentially fruitless wait.
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As far as I know, it's only Standard Parcels and ParcelForce that don't cover breakage for antiques, collectables, glass and ceramics.
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Nic's right - the only Royal Mail service that won't cover damage or breakage to glass and ceramics is Standard Parcels - all the other services are covered up to around £33 (ish, I can't remember the exact figure) and Special Delivery is £500.
Also, the onus on making a claim to the Royal Mail is with the seller, not the buyer. If I were you I'd tell the seller about the damage and see what they say. If they try to shirk their responsibilities just escalate it to a claim via PayPal (assuming you paid by PayPal of course) and then leave appropriate feedback.
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I hope the seller will take care of it. Most will. Give them a few days to respond before getting concerned. Going through PayPal for resolution is good, but I wouldn't file for a refund through them unless you have to. I don't know about overseas shipping, but for same-country claims PayPal requires the package be sent back to the seller. It can be mighty expensive. If you used a credit card, it is easier and cheaper to just do a chargeback through them. I hope you won't have to do this and that the seller will get back to you quickly.
Anita
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I stand corrected, 1st class does cover glass, etc. as Pip and Nic say. Thankfully I have'nt had cause to file a claim for a few years so I'm a bit rusty on the rules.
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Royal mail site put it in your favourites takes some trawling through. Always useful for reference and to see if sellers are over charging for postage. Always ask what service they will be using and weight of item plus packaging, as they say bubble wrap it, box it, bubble wrap it again, then box it again. Ask them to pack this way for you when you have made a purchase, at the end of the day it is your property once paid for and they should treat it as such. Used to work for royal mail seen some horror wrapping, glass in brown paper e,t,c believe me. Good luck with claim by the way it is up to seller to claim if i remember rightly, so if he reimburses you its up to him if he claims. Good luck Mark
http://www.royalmail.com/portal/rm/content2?catId=77300736&mediaId=80000739#72800834
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by the way it is up to seller to claim if i remember rightly, so if he reimburses you its up to him if he claims.
Either sender or reciever can file a claim, for example if an item had been paid for by cheque/postal order and the seller were not to issue a refund the buyer can still make a claim as long as they can obtain a proof of posting, etc.
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Having had *far* too much experience of parcels going missing or getting damaged over the last few years, I know that either the sender or the recipient can make a claim when things go awry - but whoever does it also needs the original proof of posting to enclose with the claim form, so most logically it's the seller that instigates the claim.
If the seller is playing fair, neither of you will have to cough up the cost of sending the parcel back to sender - Royl Mail will provide an address and code to stick on the front of the parcel for their inspection, and this can be sent by either party.
Edit: Ah, Martyn beat me to it. ;D
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Can't tell from the image, but if nobody recognises it, there is always the possibility that the two pieces may not have started life together.
Was it a clean break?
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Does it have a mould line running on each side of the opalescent part?
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It broke just below the cameo, and it wasn't a clean break, but several chips and tiny splinters of glass in the packaging. It does have a mould line down the stem. I would love to know what it is. The opalescent glass fluoresces under UV light, and has a lovely shine, more opal like than any similar glass I have seen before, almost red in the light.
It wasn't really very well packed, with just one layer of bubble wrap around it, and then the space around it in the box filled with crumpled newspaper. I bought two items together, the other was a bowl with a metal rim, and he had stood the stem in the bowl, but not packed it around, so it looks as though it has banged against the metal rim, which would act like a hammer I should have thought.
I am still waiting to hear back from the seller.
Here are some more pictures to help with identification.
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That looks like totally inadequate packing to me, particularly in with something else.
I would have said the comport was probably Italian - but that's only a guess.
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My dear old Mum has a really lovely comport with a stem not dissimilar to this, it shows up reddish amber when held to the light. I've always believed it was Italian, so I'd guess alongside Christine. :)
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Thanks for the replies. I am still waiting to hear from the seller, but maybe they don't look at ebay over the weekend.
Does anyone have any idea of what the resale value of this item would have been if unbroken? Would I claim the resale value (which was where it was headed) or the amount I paid?
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Would I claim the resale value (which was where it was headed) or the amount I paid?
LOL! I like the way your mind works LittleBlackHen! Just the amount you paid. ;) ;D
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Lol :)
I was thinking of when my mother in law claimed for a lot of broken pottery when a china cabinet fell off the wall - the shards were assessed by an auctioneer and she was paid on the assessed value, not on the amount she had paid for them. She was always a canny buyer, so she made a profit on it, although she would rather have had her precious collection intact.
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Royal mail site put it in your favourites takes some trawling through. Always useful for reference and to see if sellers are over charging for postage. Always ask what service they will be using and weight of item plus packaging, as they say bubble wrap it, box it, bubble wrap it again, then box it again.
I had to respond to this because when I was selling on eBay it was one of my bugbears that some customers get wrongly hoity about postage charges. What many buyers don't appreciate is that it's Postage AND Packing - which means that it's not just the stamp cost - the packing materials and and a handling charge can be levied on top - and this is in the eBay guidelines. I would also suggest that if you're not happy with the P&P quoted on the listing, don't bid. It's theoretically impossible to 'overcharge' someone when they've agreed to the postage charge displayed by buying the item. The fact is simply that the buyer agreed to the postage charge then once they've received the parcel and looked at the stamp price on the parcel they decide they've been 'overcharged' without taking into consideration the packaging and handling costs which is just silly IMO.
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Postage AND Packing
And packing is not only packaging materials, it is also time, and time is money!
It is not unusual to spend half an hour packing a single complex piece for shipment. It isn't always a five minute job.
I usually don't put a fragile sticker on a box. I prefer to pack to a standard that assumes that some of the hands that handle the parcel will not love and cherish the contents.
On practically every occasion that I have received something broken, the reason was that it was not packed properly.
But I can understand entirely why some carriers will not insure glass. It is because they know that many people will not pack it properly. Interestingly many of the carriers who say they won't carry glass or insure it, will actually do so if they are dealing with a firm that they know can pack to a satisfactory standard.
The quality and strength of the outer box is very important. If you are able to show that a strong outer has been damaged, it is easier to see a claim through, only if the piece has been packed properly inside. However, many people use just any old cardboard box. Always try to select a double wall box, but bear in mind that not all double wall cardboard is the same strength. Computer or TV boxes are the sort of strength I would recommend.
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The fact is simply that the buyer agreed to the postage charge then once they've received the parcel and looked at the stamp price on the parcel they decide they've been 'overcharged' without taking into consideration the packaging and handling costs which is just silly IMO.
There are a couple of exceptions - there have been a few times where the stated P&P has been so high that you're lead to assume that it's going to arrive via an express service with full insurance and/or with exemplary brand new packaging materials, and it trundles up a week later by Standard Parcel wrapped in well-worn bubblewrap in a shoddy old box and has a £5-£10+ mark-up on the postage costs. I've complained in those circumstances. Another exception would be if the seller has actually stated it was going to be sent by an express service, and it arrives via a standard one. Again, this has raised complaint from me in the past.
But even if the packing material were new, it doesn't really justify that kind of price-bump. I buy all of my packing materials - and I've just run out after a very busy week and have reordered supplies - £40-£50 of bubblewrap, packing peanuts and parcel tape generally lasts me around 4-6 months. If a seller is buying in their boxes then I could understand a few pounds more on top, but I've only ever received items in new boxes on a handful of occasions.
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But this is the point Nic - if the postage shown were high, I'd query it before I bought the item - not afterwards. And whilst I agree that there are some sellers on eBay using the postage to fee evade and profiteer I don't attempt to justify their actions - what I'm talking about are instances where, for example, my postage costs were shown as £4.50 - this figure was arrived at by the actual postage cost of £3.75 plus 75p to cover new (and abundant) packing materials and my time in packing and handling. The customer complained bitterly when they received the parcel that the postage spent was only £3.75 ::). These are the instances I'm talking about and they're not rare. I no longer sell on eBay, I'm a buyer only and when I wish to buy an item I look at the postage cost and the item price together before I decide to buy. If the postage seems excessive I'll query it with the seller before buying and make my decision based on their reply. But I wouldn't buy first, look at the stamp and then start complaining about being 'over-charged'.
This is one of the main reasons that my website offers free postage to all UK addresses - to avoid this sort of hassle!
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The couple of times I've complained about postage costs have been when the item I've bought has been so expensive and weighty that sending it insured would be the only sensible option, so I didn't really ponder it too much before bidding.
The last instance was a 3kg glass vase with a £175 pricetag and £23 for shipping. Special delivery for that item would run to a little over £20, so the shipping cost didn't really raise any alarms as I'm fully used to paying that kind of sum. Then it arrived with an £8 Standard Parcels label and I wasn't too chuffed. I don't mind paying for things posted well, but I do take exception to dealers like that.
But less than £3 difference I wouldn't really even register, never mind grumble over. Thankfully I've not had any buyers quite like that. Although I did have one buyer through my website (with free shipping, like yours) who bought a handful of items and then tried to demand a discount because the shipping was built into the cost and it would cost me less to ship them all together than if several people had bought them. ::)
I guess there's no avoiding such folk.
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I don't complain often about postage charges, but one where I have was buying silver jewellery, which had a 75p postage charge per item, which added up to over £12 in total as I bought a lot. I did ask if they would combine it, and they reduced it to £10. The whole lot arrived together in a small jiffy envelope with £1.20 postage paid. I gave them positive feedback but commented that I thought their combined postage charge was high - the next time I went to buy I found they had blocked me from buying from them - even though I had bought hundreds of pounds worth from them over a year. Their choice, I now get it cheaper from elsewhere.
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Thankfully I've not had any buyers quite like that.
Well I think that tempted the fates - someone just gave me a really low eBay rating on P&P costs over 54p I added, breaking my perfect 5/5 score. But then they also rated me low on other aspects, without reason or cause. >:(
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That's a shame Nic :(
I am happy with the seller of the Cameo comport, although he hasn't offered a refund he has instigated a claim with the post office on my behalf, but he says it usually takes weeks, so he obviously has some prior knowledge ::)
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To update on this saga, I received full compensation from the seller, with a bit added for the inconvenience, so I am very happy with this.
Unfortunately I now have a lovely little Thomas Webb bowl, clear glass with vaseline glass feet which also arrived in shards last week, and the seller is not answering my emails :( I guess some you win, some you lose.